


What Is Truth? (The Variations on Reality Remix)

by moosesal



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-31
Updated: 2009-12-31
Packaged: 2017-10-05 13:34:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/42284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moosesal/pseuds/moosesal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam and his relationships while at Stanford. A Remix of the story <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/rhysmae/2824.html">Verisimilitude</a> by maerhys for 2009 kamikazeremix.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Is Truth? (The Variations on Reality Remix)

_What Sam owns_

Sam's life before now has been recorded in soft pencil marks across a road map of his world -- the lower forty-eight. He now has a map of Palo Alto and the Stanford campus to add to his personal history. He clutches them tight in his hand so as not to drop them and lose a part of who he is.

~~~

His bed is at once too small and too large -- his feet hanging over the end, the space between him and the wall empty. He tries curling up with a blanket, but it's not the same. Within days he finds himself running at five in the morning, his bed already made with precise hospital corners. If he sometimes crawls back into it later, wool scratching his face as he curls into the extra blanket and empty space, no one is there to see.

~~~

With time he gets to know people, gets asked to hang out with some classmates in a bar. They laugh and joke and tell stories from high school. More than one person says _Winchester, you're a quiet one. Too silent for your size, man._ Silent but observant -- the crappy fake IDs the bartender doesn't even blink at, the pool players across the room who he could easily win cash off of, the almost-milky taste of beer sliding down his throat. He watches and listens, laughs at their punch lines and pretends to get the pop culture references; no one notices that he doesn't chime in. He has nothing to contribute.

~~~

At the end of his first year, he decides to major in pre-law and he registers for Spanish figuring it'd be good to know a living language. Not even two hours later he switches to Latin and adds an American folklore class for the next semester.

On his birthday he goes out and ends up buying a copy of _Directorium Inquisitorum_ with the intention of reselling it or sending it to Bobby. When he gets back to the dorm he stops by his mailbox and finds a postcard from Dean. He can't escape his past; his breath hitches as he reads _Happy birthday, only a few fractured fingers so no worries, sorry for the chicken scratch. D_ He tucks the postcard inside his new book, hurries up to his room, and falls face down on his bed. Hiding. But there's no one there to see.

It's the end of finals and his roommate is already gone.

~~~

Dean is his constant in life. The marks on his map not only tell Sam's story, but spell out Dean's name in a language only Sam speaks. He goes through life saying _Dammit Dean_ so that no one will notice he really means _I love you, don't fucking die on me._

~~~

_What Jessica knows_

She sees him across the room of their "Methodology in Ethics" class and just knows that there's something there. Something she wants to know. So she approaches him after class and takes him home. She tells him all about herself. When she asks _What about you? What's your family like?_ he kisses her and she knows she's not going to get an answer. She doesn't care.

~~~

She takes him to her bed and after she figures out it's his first time. Somehow she also knows that it's not. In the morning she climbs on top of him, sheathing him in a condom and taking him again. She wasn't his first and she won't be his last -- his first will be his last.

~~~

When he moves in with nothing more than a duffle bag of clothes and a box of books and old cassette tapes, she's knows to take what she can get. She's okay with that. For now.

~~~

She knows his body by touch -- a name for every vein, a story for every scar, all of her own making.

~~~

When they lie back to back in bed, Sam facing the door -- always on guard, waiting, watching -- Jess knows that he loves her. She also knows it's not forever. Something or _someone_ is coming. She's content to have what she can while it lasts. She loves him; he loves her as much as he can.

~~~

She violates his trust, knowing it's the only way to figure anything out. She flips through the postcards he keeps tucked away underneath his carefully folded T-shirts. The words are terrifying and only make her wonder more about his past. As she traces her fingers over the words on the postcard -- _Another three stitches to the right shoulder but no dislocation, nothing like those four digs on your collar_ \-- she can feel the lines on Sam's body. Thin, thick, jagged, smooth, unnatural from things she cannot imagine. She tells herself that no one knows Sam's body like she does. She knows she's lying.

~~~

It means something that after a year of living together Sam places a photo of his parents on a shelf in her living room. _Their_ living room. By his breath and reaction to her words, she knows Sam sees their mother's eyes in Dean, not himself. She wonders if she'll ever see Dean. She knows when she does it'll be moments before Sam walks out the door.

~~~

She drops one of Sam's occult books and a stack of photos spills out; it's an opportunity to learn more about his past. The details come in moments like this -- accidents and stumbles that piece together his life. She sees two boys with a man she knows to be John and several images across time of a young man with a wicked smile, including a close-up of him rolling his eyes at the camera. She knows this must be Dean and Sam confirms it when she asks. The picture of the two of them leaning against a car makes it clear that it doesn't matter that Sam gets only two postcards a year (no phone calls or e-mails) from him. She knows their connection will never be broken even as Sam's slips the photos back into the book and refuses to talk about it.

~~~

He thinks she doesn't see his heartache, but really she stays quiet because there's nothing she can do about it.

~~~

She knows Sam. Her Sam. Not the _Sammy_ Dean asked for on the phone. Not the _Winchester_ who covered his map with faint markings she cannot decipher. She knows a quiet pre-law student with his mother's eyes, his father's mouth, and no trace of Dean on him anywhere. She knows this Sam and only this Sam. _Her Sam._ She thinks she might not know him at all.

~~~

_What Dean holds back_

He's wanted to call so many times over the last two years. He couches his check-in call behind jokes. He says _Is this Jim Rockford?_ and _Calm down, little brother, the hotness is all in one piece and the chicks dig the scars._ What he means is _You alright?_ and _I'm hanging in there_ and feelings he cannot even come up with words for about a touch that cannot be replaced. Not even by hot chicks who dig scars.

~~~

He lies on his postcards to Sam. Lies of omission. He writes about injuries because it's easier than what he feels. Easier than the truth. Easier than _Miss you, little brother_ and _come home_ and the reasons why he can't say either of those things.

~~~

He tells Sammy that he and dad are hunting separately now and when Sammy starts to yell at him he cuts him off. "I'll be okay, Sam, goddam, you'd think I haven't been doing this for fourteen years." Translation: _I love you more than anything but this is the job, what we -- I was made for._ Sam's petulant "Yeah, whatever" tells him he's been understood. Sam has always understood.

~~~

He's happy for Sam. Happy that he's got a life and a girl and roots. He says as much. He puts Sammy ahead of himself, suppressing his wants, holding back the full extent of his feelings about Sam's new life.

~~~

Good-bye. The one word that never passes between them. Instead he kissed it across Sam's skin the night before he'd left for Stanford. A night that started with him slamming Sam against the wall and ended with bruises on Dean's heart. They hang up with the word unspoken once again. It's a word they've never needed. This is their life.


End file.
